Fátima ao detalhe | 13 Outubro 1917 | Aliança de Santa Maria

OCTOBER 13, 1917
FÁTIMA IN DETAIL

Sr. Maria Benedita Costa, asm
Sister of the Covenant of St. Mary

October 13, 1917 [1]

After repeating the promise that the following month there would be "a miracle so that everyone would believe" - news that, using the most effective method of dissemination at the time, word of mouth, quickly reached not only the north and south of the country, but even across borders - the days leading up to October 13, 1917 were characterized by an intense - and never before seen - movement of pilgrims and onlookers towards the hitherto inhospitable, unknown and inaccessible site of Cova da Iria.

As Sister Lucia herself tells us in her report that in her Memories makes our day[2] - which we'll dispense with when it comes to what she and her cousins saw while the crowd was witnessing the miracle of the sun - the crowd present that day at the Cova da Iria was so large that, in order to be able to guarantee their presence at "the time appointed" by Our Lady, the Little Shepherds had to leave home "quite early, counting on the delays along the way".

Reading the account of the Memoirs of this Apparition, (almost) nothing tells us about the "Miracle of the Sun" itself which - to everyone's amazement - none of the Little Shepherds saw, since, while it was taking place, they were contemplating the sequence of visions recounted in the Memoirs, as Lucia's response to one of the interrogations following the Apparition confirms: "At the time I was seeing this image, the people were shouting: Look! Look! It's so beautiful! And I looked too, telling the people to look there, that there was St. Joseph and then Our Lord"[3].

This solar phenomenon was attested to and reported by thousands of witnesses - believers and non-believers alike - who, marked by their experience, couldn't "not proclaim" what they had seen and heard that day. The scale of the expected event was so great that "O Século", from Lisbon, sent a special envoy to the Cova da Iria, in the person of Avelino de Almeida, who entitled his article on October 15: "Amazing things! How the sun danced at noon in Fatima - The apparitions of the Virgin - What the sign from heaven consisted of - Many thousands of people claim the miracle took place - War and peace""[4].

In fact, there are countless reports of unexplained colors and movements, as well as the effects they had on the crowd, of which we will give just two examples:

"The rain had been pouring since morning. At Lucia's voice, the rain stopped. Then the sun was seen by the crowd as a dull silver disc, taking on the various colors of the rainbow: orange, green, blue, pink and gold. At one point, it seemed to detach from the sky and fall to earth. Then it seemed to swirl around itself. This movement caused the crowd to shout: "Miracle! Miracle! Forgiveness and mercy!". The duration of this movement was calculated differently: from ten to fifteen minutes."[5].

"Like the rest of the crowd, we then looked at the sun with sustained attention and, through the clouds, we saw it with new aspects: new to us, mind you. Sometimes surrounded by fiery flames, sometimes haloed in yellow or faded purple, sometimes seemingly animated by a very fast rotational movement, sometimes even appearing to stand out from the sky, approaching the earth and radiating a strong heat. Why deny it? These phenomena, which we had never seen before, made a strong impression on us"[6].

We end with the words that Bishop José Alves Correia da Silva, Bishop of Leiria, included about the "Miracle of the Sun" in his Pastoral Letter declaring the Cova da Iria Apparitions "worthy of credit"[7]"This phenomenon, which no astronomical observatory has recorded and was therefore not natural, was witnessed by people from all walks of life, believers and unbelievers, journalists from the main Portuguese newspapers and even individuals from kilometers away, which destroys any explanation of collective illusion"[8].

[1] For the sake of accessibility of sources for those who wish to delve deeper into the subject, we cite them from the work of Luciano Coelho Cristino (CRISTINO, L. C., The Apparitions of Fatima: a reconstruction based on documents(Fátima, Santuário de Fátima, 2017, 1st ed.), in which each Apparition was treated individually from the point of view of the documentary sources.

[2] JESUS, Lúcia de, Memories of Sister Lucia IFátima, Secretariat of the Little Shepherds, 2007, 13th edition, p. 180-181.

[3] CRISTINO, L. C., The Apparitions..., p. 95.

[4] CRISTINO, L. C., The Apparitions..., p. 94.

[5] CRISTINO, L. C., The Apparitions..., p. 91-92.

[6] CRISTINO, L. C., The Apparitions..., p. 97.

[7] "Pastoral Letter of Bishop José Alves Correia da Silva, Bishop of Leiria, on the cult of Our Lady of Fatima", DOCUMENTATION Critical of Fatima: Selection of Documents (1917-1930). Text setting, introductions and notes by Luciano Coelho Cristino. Fátima: Shrine of Fátima, 2013, Doc. 133, p. 539-551.

[8] CRISTINO, L. C., The Apparitions..., p. 99.

Science and God

Fatima in detail | September 13, 1917

SEPTEMBER 13, 1917FÁTIMA IN DETAIL Sr. Maria Benedita Costa, asmSister of the Covenant of St. Mary September 13, 1917 [1]Contrary to what many expected - both among the civil authorities and among the family of the Little Shepherds and the inhabitants of Aljustrel -...

Fatima in detail | August 19, 1917

19 AUGUST 1917FÁTIMA IN DETAIL Sr. Maria Benedita Costa, asmSister of the Covenant of St. Mary The events surrounding August 13, 1917, were much more than the experience of a trauma - which could have occurred because they were removed against their will...